Have you recently been considering, or even just purchased a beautiful little toy best known as a balance bike for your or someone else’s child?
Well, we believe you have made a wonderful decision in purchasing a kid’s toy that is rich in development potential.
Now that you have helped introduce a budding young rider to the wonderful world of balance bikes, it’s the perfect time, in fact we believe the time to ensure your little gem is learning all about balance bike safety and are kitted-out with the best available safety equipment as they begin their journey into such an amazing activity.
In this, our second and final article in our two-part series on balance bike safety for kids, we complete our 10-step guide presenting you with steps 6 – 10 on balance bike safety.
Overall, our goal is to help parents and carers feel empowered and knowledgeable with the right information about balance bike safety and for you to embrace the opportunity presented as a role model to help educate your budding bike champion with the correct skills, techniques and equipment essential to balance bike safety.
GOMO Balance Bike – Practice and Safety = Fun!
You can find at Amazon USA here or Amazon AUS here
So we now invite you to sit back, refresh yourself with a nutritious and delicious snack and enjoy our second article, in our two-part series Balance Bike Safety for Kids – Part II.
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Our 10-Step Guide to Balance Bike Safety for Kids
Part II – Steps 6 to 10
6. Eyewear – Sunglasses
If you have ever ridden a bike without sunglasses you will absolutely appreciate how such a simple invention can improve your vision while riding and therefore greatly improve rider safety.
“a comfortable, snug fitting pair of sunglasses can easily improve our ability to see clearly and protect our eyes from the elements”
As you ride your vision may become impaired due to the wind, dust and dirt that naturally will get into your eyes while outdoors moving at speed on a balance bike.
Fortunately for us, a comfortable, snug fitting pair of sunglasses can easily improve our ability to see clearly and protect our eyes from the elements.
Your child’s eyes, while moving relatively slowly, will still experience exposure to the atmospheric conditions when riding a balance bike.
A pair of inexpensive, comfortable fitting, shaded sunglasses will do the trick here in providing protection for their precious little eyes and again improve upon their safety as they tackle the world on two wheels.
7. Balance Bike Fit
Your child will naturally develop, at their own pace, the correct balance bike motor patterns and rider skills if we ensure the balance bike is the correct fit for their unique little bodies.
That is, a balance bike can work it’s magic in helping to develop all the essential skills including balance and coordination if the rider is able to safety touch the ground flat-footed, when seated in the saddle. A slight bend at the knees is also perfectly fine in this position.
From this correct position, your child will be able to safely and effectively propel themselves using their feet, confidently decelerate, stop and as their confidence grows, glide along by placing their feet onto the footrests when needed.
GOMO Balance Bike in action – a wonderful budget friendly option!
Find at Amazon USA here or Amazon AUS here
8. Suitable Riding Environment
This is a key factor contributing to balance bike rider safety and well-deserved to appear in our 10-step guide.
Where your child is exposed to riding will play a huge part in developing the right skills, at the right time. When just beginning, we advise looking for the following terrain,
- flat, open spaces away from any traffic or roads, and
- soft surfaces such as grassy parks or artificial turf surfaces
Practical, safe surfaces worth considering include athletic tracks, quiet pedestrian or cycle paths, open parks with grass and surrounding walking paths, and tennis / basketball courts.
As they become more confident, you can gently allow them to explore more undulating, hilly and off-road terrain.
These are not only a lot of fun to explore as their skills develop, but provide a natural progression that a rider will experience as they seek to expand their horizons on two wheels.
Kinderfeets Balance Bike – ready for action on any terrain!
Find at Amazon USA here or Amazon AUS here
9. Road Safety
“having meaningful and timely conversations with your child during their balance bike fun, will deepen their learning and understanding of road rules and bicycle safety”
By the time your child has started to learn how to ride a balance bike, they are primed and ready to be educated on the essential road rules that any road user should abide by.
Having meaningful and timely conversations with your child during their balance bike fun, will deepen their learning and understanding of road rules and bicycle safety.
We recommend discussing the basics with your child prior to, during and after their riding to help them engage in these new concepts, and more clearly appreciate that you as parents or carers, take their balance bike safety seriously and that they should too!
Begin by teaching your child the basics.
Some examples include stopping at intersections, waiting to cross roads together with an adult only, looking out for any moving traffic and where looking for other road users in certain environments.
Have discussions with your child about additional safety considerations in your community that we need to be vigilant towards when riding. These may include parked cars, children playing, neighbor’s pets, fallen branches or trees, water over the path, and other pedestrians that require special attention such as the elderly or parents with babies.
ROLLA Balance Bike – Super lightweight frame and inflatable tires helps make for a smoother ride on any terrain!
Find here at Amazon AUS
Your ability to communicate simple, essential road safety techniques now will do wonders for their ability to remain safe into the future.
10. Role Model Balance Bike Safety
This last tip in our guide to balance bike safety for kids is simple. We as parents and carers are to model the behaviors that we wish our children to emulate.
From a psychological perspective, what we say and do is imitated by those we interact with. For parents and carers, what we say and do in the presence of our children forms the model of behavior being developed at any stage of your child’s development.
“to correctly develop and teach the right behaviors, we are to ensure that we model the behaviors we wish to see our children develop, in our own!”
When talking about balance bikes, we are introducing our little gems to the physical, social and emotional learning at the crucial period in their development. Therefore, parents and carers must actively model balance bike, or big bike 🙂 safety measures to our children.
KRIDDO Balance Bike – provides some excellent safety features!
Find here at Amazon USA or Amazon AUS
Practically, what does this look like on the road? Well, quite simply, it means we take the time to talk with our little rider’s about safety before, during and after we ride.
To correctly develop and teach the right behaviors, we are to ensure that we actively model the behaviors we wish to see our children develop, in our own. By riding beside our children wearing a helmet and additional safety equipment, while nurturing an and understanding of road safety you are cultivating wonderful habits that given time, will be reflected in your child’s behaviors in the future.
Conclusion
If you are reading this conclusion we applaud you (yes really!) for your time and interest in helping to make your child safer while out enjoying fun and exciting adventures as they explore the world on their balance bikes.
You are not only providing your little rider with every opportunity to cultivate important bike safety habits and learning, but are contributing to making our communities safer by being a role model for others to emulate.
Balance bike safety for kids seems, well let’s be honest here, like a no brainer. Surely we would assume that parents would want to promote the best possible methods and means to ensure our kids are safe on their balance bikes.
We believe this to be absolutely true. However, parents who are just getting started riding the parentcycle need clear, accessible, valid guidelines to make this desire a reality.
Firstbike Balance Bike – designed with brilliant safety features!
Find at Amazon USA here or Amazon AUS here
That’s our motivation behind our balance bike safety for kids guidelines and that’s why we won’t hold back in shouting-out our praises to you for taking the time to read and hopefully, implement these guidelines as you help promote balance bike safety for your child.
We really hope you have enjoyed reading and learning all about balance bike safety for kids. As always, if you have any questions or comments you would like to make regarding this topic, or about balance bikes more broadly, don’t hesitate to leave these below as we genuinely love to hear from you here at ilovetoridemybike.com.
Ride safe, have fun!
I would have never thought of wearing sunglasses while riding but reading the reasoning makes a lot of sense, even for children. I also agree that you need to be teaching your child road safety from early on, because at some point they are going to be riding on the roads and they need to be aware of the dangers.
For sizing could I just get the childs leg measurements before purchasing to ensure the correct fit or would the child need to be with when making the purchase?
Hi Michel, thank you for your comments and questions. For sizing, it would be best to have the child with you so that they can sit on the bike. This way you can be sure that the seat will adjust to the correct height for them, which would mean they can comfortably sit in the seat, having their feet either flat on the ground, or with the heal just slightly raised. The seat should have a great range of adjustment (up or down) so that the child can get many years of use from the balance bike. I hope this helps you!
Thank you for another set of lessons regarding balance bike safety for children. Guiding children via verbal interaction is very important. I agree with you on instructing them on things like waiting to cross the road with adults, looking out for moving traffic and watching out for other folks using the road. These is essential safety tips all road users must learn
Hey a great post but also a really helpful one too!
It’s like my mind has been read for a second as I was thinking to purchase a bike for a friends daughter but to be honest was clueless about the safety. This post has helped me a lot to consider quite a few things when it comes to child safety. I think it’ll be wise if I take a look at the first part to this post. Safety is definitely number one and comfort too!
Hi Sariyah, we are so glad you found our article helpful and sounds like it was also timely! Yes, please have a read of our Part I on balance bike safety for kids, this provides essentially what you could call, higher priority safety tips for you, starting at number 1 with a helmet. The list is extensive and is only a guide as to what’s available and recommended. The items can and should be added to your balance bike safety kit over time. Just starting with the basics, then adding some great items over time for your little rider. Thank you for your comments and feedback.